How it works
So you’ve Tindered, you’ve Happned, even wrestled with the Cupid, now what?
Have you stumbled across to the Bumble Dating App?
Bumble Dating is like Tinder and Once dating app’s child. You swipe right or left depending on who gives you that “mmmm” feeling and wait for a match.
This app’s unique selling point though, similar to Once, is placing the first move in the hands of the ladies. In order for a man to speak with a lady, you have to both match and then the timer begins. 24hrs for the lady to send the first message. When the first message has been sent, the male then has 24hrs to reply and keep the momentum going. But unless either chooses to “Block” or “Un-Match” the conversation channel is then locked in once the guy replies. Phew…. No pressure then…
You can carry on swiping through your potential matches building up your “F£ck Yes” or “F£ck Nos” as much as you like which is where it takes the lead over Once in my opinion, that only supplies one suggested match every 24hrs.
Although my Bumble mysteriously stumbled… at one point saying that London had run out of women…?
I was back up and running a few minutes later though.
Signing Up To Bumble Dating
As with many of the apps now, signing up is via Facebook login, this is the only way to sign up to Bumble at the moment according to their help FAQs.
When you enter your Facebook login, the app then requests permissions to various data on Facebook. One of them being your friends list. I disallowed this as I didn’t see why they would need that. But it appeared to let me continue through to the app and carry on setting up my profile regardless.
Similar to Tinder, your pictures are chosen from your Facebook galleries and basic information such as first name, age, gender and date of birth are set. Weirdly Bumble allows you to change your gender once. Why? Who knows, possibly to resolve situations where you may have had a gender change on Facebook and not remembered….?
Do you have to Pay?
No, it’s FREE, however as with many apps, premium features come at a cost. Bumble calls this “The Boost”.
For £7.99 per month The Boost gives you:-
- Access to your Beeline, people that have already swiped right on you. Although I’d have thought you’d come across these naturally anyway?
- When you have matched with someone and you let the time run out it opens up expired matches that you may not have replied to quick enough.
- Extends. (For the men) So you can really look like a stalker. This extends the person as many times as you like, so that you really know they don’t want to match with you when your face doesn’t disappear after 24hrs.
- Buy More Time. (For Women). Not sure of the point in this as it would take literally seconds to send someone a message. “Hi” being the pretty common one I found.
Key Features
- Swiping right or left on your likes or no thanks.
- Full control over your chosen pictures and main picture.
- Full control over your profile “About me” section.
- Unlimited chat with a matched member on the app.
- Ability to turn notifications on or off.
- Preferred distanced from your served potential dates. Great for those who don’t like to go south of the river? (London Joke).
- Selecting your chosen age range in settings.
- Showing your favoured sex or even BFF, for those only looking for “friends”.
Pros
- Very well coded app, easy to use and fast. No hangs or freezes that I experienced.
- Free usage as long as you aren’t bothered about the extra features.
- Gives more control to the ladies, which as a guy, why not? We can sit back and wait for a change.
- As a result of the female lead required, women do seem more pro-active.
- Photo verification, nice touch, prevent those “Catfish” dates.
Cons
- As with the Once dating app, Bumble times out matches and messages within 24hrs. This kind of sucks as not everyone checks their apps every day. When they are gone, they are gone for good.
- Unless you purchase the Boost features, you cannot extend or bring back matches or messages that you may have wanted to engage with.
- Not convinced on how close the matches are, most of mine were at the very outer limits that I’d set. Tinder appears to be better at locating closer dates.
To Conclude The Bumble Review
It’s certainly an improvement over Once. More like Tinder, Bumble allows you to carry on your virtual exploration even after you have some matched timers rolling. I much preferred this as it makes the chances of a match actually engaging higher.
Top tip from me would be to swipe in the morning on the way into work or on the way back. If a match times out in the middle of the night, you are more likely to lose them. Bumble is good about prompting time outs as they are about to happen.
Women that choose to use Bumble to date, understand that the first move is in their hands. So guys, sit back and wait. But don’t be fooled, once they send that first message, you still have to impress to get a date in person.
Have you tried the Bumble Dating App? Leave me a comment here and tell me about your experiences.
Interesting to read about Bumble from a guys perspective. As a woman using it I find the fact that I have constantly start the conversation (and usually try to come up with something more innovative than ‘hi, how are you?’ can be tiresome). Which is your favourite dating app?
I use a toolkit when it comes to dating, Tinder, Bumble, Happn and OKCupid being my current ones. Tinder has taken a massive downturn as they have pushed to monitise it far too hard with adverts and restrictions. I get a fraction of the matches on Tinder that I used to. Bumble is a little like watching paint dry, women aren’t used to making the first move. While it seems like a good idea, I do generally only get messages like “Hi” which are a real non starter. If anything Bumble hopefully has highlighted to women that making the first move isnt as simple as they thought.
James, interesting blog. No, I’ve not personally used Bumble, Tinder, Once or any such app, my interest is more from the perspective of a onlooker. Having read a few articles referencing Tinder and such apps, I seriously question the purpose of the people who join them. Are they actually looking for love, someone to relate and feel an affinity with, to share core values and aspirations for the future to what was known as being on the same trajectory path….or as I suspect from some of those articles I’ve read ” just a hook-up, casual sex, and the only reason to connect is based upon the physical, regardless of whether that person has the same relationship or dating goals as you. As a matchmaker, what I’ve noticed in particular over the last decade with the growth of these apps, that women coming to me are complaining that is it far more difficult to have a serious relationship with a guy, to enjoy exclusiveness, to be in a committed relationship, as guys no longer need to court…what a lovely old fashioned, out dated word, but conjures up exactly without any other words, the exact meaning of two people’s aim. Dating, however, can mean anything from casual sex, dating without an end goal, fun, as in several new dates a week and many other connotations in between to looking for a life partner. I’m not sure the likes of Tinder, Once or Bumble are really platforms for the seriously relationship minded to meet the love of their life and walk off into the sunset. I started off as a matchmaker just over 15 years ago and since then there has been a real downward spiral for women 33+ especially when wanting to marry and have a family as they feel the modern male under 40 has everything at his fingertips without having to commit. I’m not a feminist, but I do feel for women who really want to settle down and find the challenges to do so are like climbing Mount Everest backwards with lead boots on. Still, I’m sure the likes of Tinder and the numerous apps will continue to flourish in our fast paced, instant gratification world we live in!
Well if you know any 30+ women that are looking for a cool guy, then feel free to drop me a male I know several including myself 🙂
Good read. very honest. more honest than I thought it would be. New to this site so I am hopping there are more reviews. keep up the great work!